D.C. and Pabst Blue Ribbon: A Hundred Years of Love

This is the beer you’ll see dominating bars like Solly’s, Red Palace or Wonderland. So this short “Old Ads and Classifieds” post is for them. Pabst was a much larger brewery in the early 1900s and this is an ad from the Washington Times in 1903. So, in honor of what’s probably going to go down in these bars tonight, here it is.

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Tom founded Ghosts of DC on January 4th, 2012 as a blog to uncover the lost and untold history of Washington, D.C. He has lived in the city for over a decade and loves exploring every corner of the District.

Erin

Ohhh PBR…tastes like bad water.

http://gravatar.com/tszollos Tom Sz

I wonder what PBR tasted pre-Prohibition? From what I read the recipes were more in accordance to the Reinheitsgebot – only water, yeast, barley, and hops – whereas during WWII they were forced to add adjuncts like rice since barley went to the war effort. After the war soldiers who had become accustomed to the weaker beer didn’t demand the better version and so we inherited these unique “American” lagers – the PBRs, Naty Bohs, and so on. Too bad such a rich heritage of brewing has become the butt of jokes.

Hope you feel better Tom. Keep up the interesting posts! (Oh, by the way, check out Mabel Walker Willebrandt. She was a famous Columbia Heights resident. The most powerful woman in the country during Prohibition.)